The Background description provided herein is for the purpose of generally presenting the context of the disclosure. Work of the presently named inventors, to the extent it is described in this background section, as well as aspects of the description which may not otherwise qualify as prior art at the time of filing, are neither expressly or impliedly admitted as prior art against the present disclosure.
Phase-change materials have been proposed for use in memory devices. Phase-change materials may be electrically programmed between various states. These states range from fully amorphous to fully crystalline. In a fully crystalline state, the phase-change material exhibits a low resistance. In a fully amorphous state, the phase-change material exhibits a high resistance. Interim resistance values may be provided by states between fully amorphous and fully crystalline. Phase-change materials may be used as memories by varying the resistance of the phase-change material. Each memory location can then represent one or more bits of binary data. The states of the phase-change material can be varied by holding the phase-change material at predetermined temperatures for corresponding predetermined times.